


Red Dawn

by BrandiLea



Category: Superman: red son
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-19
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:46:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26537539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrandiLea/pseuds/BrandiLea
Summary: A sequel to the film version of Superman: Red Son loosely based on the Red Daughter storyline of Supergirl season 4.
Kudos: 1





	Red Dawn

**Author's Note:**

> This is my time writing long-format fanfic, so show me some mercy, please? As stated in the summary, this story is loosely based on the Red Daughter storyline of the CW Supergirl series, so if you don't like that, save yourself the trouble and don't read this. If you do read this, I hope you enjoy.
> 
> Chapter summary: 20 years after Superman "sacrificed" himself to save Earth, Clark Kent finds new meaning in his life.
> 
> This chapter takes place in 2003.

Clark Kent was a private man. He wasn’t cold to his co-workers in the Daily Planet, but they had learned not to waste their time inviting him to any soirees. This suited him just fine though, as he had decided long ago that a life of solitude was the only one fit for a man such as himself. 

This changed, though, when Clark picked up an unusual sound with his super hearing. He stepped out onto his apartment balcony and focused on the sound, drowning out the noises of the city below. 

He homed in on the direction from where the sound came and determined that it was a large object that had entered the atmosphere and was making its way towards the earth. Clark then used his telescopic vision to further pinpoint the object’s location and saw that it was, in fact, a ship.

Clark took flight. Traveling hundreds of miles southwest, he kept his focus on the vessel as it made its descent. As he got closer, he shifted his trajectory upwards and braced himself to catch the ship.

He flew headlong into the rocket, arms outstretched. He caught it easily and began making his way to the ground below. Clark placed the ship down gently and looked around at his surroundings. He was in the middle of a wheat field that reminded him much of the ones he knew as a child before he sold himself as a tool of oppression. 

Clark looked back the ship, it was small, not nearly big enough to hold even a single adult. It was simple in design but elegant. The nose came to a soft point, while three fins curved back and outwards at the end. He peered through the window and saw a young girl sleeping peacefully. Her hair was long and blonde and framed her face delicately, she wore a simple, white dress with a crest that looked like an “S” resting inside a diamond; he guessed that she couldn’t have been older than thirteen years old.

He ran his hands along the side of the ship, searching for some sort of door. He found it and lifted it up carefully. Cold air rushed at him and the girl’s eyelashes fluttered. Her eyes opened slowly and looked up at Clark. They were the same clear, saturated blue that he had only ever seen every time he looked in the mirror. 

“Hello,” she said softly, “who are you?”

This question, simple as it was, startled Clark. This girl, obviously not from the world, this stranger, asked who he was. Any other person would be able to answer this question with ease, but Clark found himself asking the same question every day. The girl’s expression grew concerned the longer he spent contemplating his answer, so he settled for the one he had given people for the last 20 years. “my name is Clark. Clark Kent.”

The girl sat up, “my name is Kara Zor-El.” 

Kara, Clark thought, that’s a nice name. He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could, she asked him something. 

“Can you help me find my cousin? He was sent to this planet like I was, and it’s very important that I find him. You see, he’s only a baby, and my parents told it would be my responsibility to take care of him from now on.”

Planet? Baby? Clark didn’t know what to make of all this. “Kara,” he said, “I need to understand what’s going on before we can start looking for your cousin, can you start from the beginning?”

So Kara did. She told him about the planet of her birth, Krypton, about how it was dying. She told him about how its leaders ignored the pleas of her father and uncle to prepare its people for a planet-wide exodus. 

“That’s why Kal and I were sent here. Our parents only had enough time and resources to build separate ships big enough for my cousin and me to escape. So, can you please, please help me find him?”

Clark nodded. Everything Kara had told him seemed impossible, but to her credit, so did a man capable of flying halfway across the country in a matter of minutes. “Of course,” he told her. 

She smiled at him, then said something that surprised Clark once again, “you look just like my uncle, Jor-El.” As she said this, a sparked of recognition danced across her eyes, “it’s you! Kal-El!” She leaped into his arms and wrapped her arms around his neck.

Clark couldn’t remember the last time another person had hugged him. It had been years, decades since someone had been this close to him. He wanted to hug her back, but instead, he pulled her off of him and placed her gently on the ground.

“You said your cousin was a baby, how could I possibly be him?”

Kara placed a closed fist over her mouth, her face scrunched in concentration. She gasped and ran back towards her ship. Clark watched as she rummaged around in it, fervently searching for something. “Found it,” she exclaimed, pulling out a small, flat disk.

She ran back to Clark and pressed a button on top of the disk. A hologram appeared, and Kara quickly swiped through it, repeating this action several times until she found what she had been looking for, and handed it to Clark.

It was an image of two men standing side by side, arms draped over the other’s shoulders. They wore thin, gold bands around their heads, and red and blue robes with the same crests Kara wore on her dress. One of the men had chestnut brown hair and a trim beard. The other man, however, left Clark with a pit in his stomach. 

He was the spitting image of Clark, or more appropriately, Clark was the spitting image of him. From his nose to his jawline, to the way he smiled, there was no denying it: Jor-El, this man from another planet, was his father.

“I don’t know how it’s possible,” Kara said, “but you have to be Kal, I just know it.”

*****

Clark buried Kara’s ship, concealing it from prying eyes. He took Kara back with him to Metropolis, where she told him more about their family and the planet of his birth. 

He quit his job at The Daily Planet shortly after and withdrew his savings. He and Kara returned to the field where her ship had was hidden, just on the outskirts of a town in Kansas named Smallville. Clark bought the land and began building a home with the help of Kara, who was beginning to demonstrate the same abilities as himself, confirming her theory that the two were related. A barn was built over the ship, and a cellar was dug to contain it. 

*****

“Kara, for the last time, I said no!” He didn’t mean to yell at her, to sound so angry. He hated seeing how much he had hurt her. But before he could apologize, she ran upstairs, slamming her bedroom door. 

Clark sighed. In the years since he had started raising Kara, the two of them had gotten along quite well. There was an adjustment period at the beginning of course, with Clark coming to terms that he was an alien sent from another planet and Kara adapting to life as an earthling, but they both had an infinite supply of patience with each other and rarely disagreed or argued. However, whenever Kara brought up the idea of using their powers to help others, Clark would immediately shut her down. 

Kara didn’t know that after saving the world from Brainiac, Clark vowed that he would never use his powers publicly again. She didn’t know anything about his past as Superman. Clark left Metropolis and took Kara to Smallville to hide her from the world. He didn’t care if he were found out and punished for his crimes, but he would never forgive himself if Kara to come to harm if her connection to him was discovered. Clark was willing to accept any resentment she may have had towards him if it kept her safe.


End file.
